Reply to How did Herndon/Westfield HS go from top to bottom?

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Reply to "How did Herndon/Westfield HS go from top to bottom?"

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]They hired a consultant because they love wasting money.

Them stating at the work session that they weren’t tackling boundaries that day wasn’t racism, which is what was suggested earlier.

Admitting that there was Anti Asian sentiment behind the push to change TJ admissions and going forward anyway? Racist

calling Brabrand “dumb and white” as a reason why he can’t manage correctly? Racist [/quote]

Oh please, learn to read between the lines. Cohen specifically announced during the MGT meeting that she had just then received emails from Daventry parents, literally as the MGT consultant was presenting his PowerPoint, asking her not to reverse the boundary change back to Lewis. Cohen felt the need to publicly reassure them that wasn't happening to take some heat off her back. Call it what you will (classism, elitism, racism, or plain selfishness), but it's glaringly obvious that the reason the Board is so defensive on the topic of boundaries is because they all know the elephant in the room.

And in case you don't know the elephant in the room either: some communities clearly feel threatened that adjustments may lead to more ELL/FARMs populations in their catchment areas.[/quote]

The wealthy don't mind if a small number of ESOL/FARMS kids are moved to their catchment areas.  They do mind very much if they might be moved to a different pyramid.

If you look at the Langley/McLean adjustment, Langley parents made it clear they were fine with having some apartments in Tysons with greater economic diversity moved into their school UNTIL the Great Falls parents realized that moving an area where additional apartments and condos are getting built might increase the odds of western Great Falls eventually getting moved to Herndon.  Then they got Tholen to make sure none of those areas were moved to Langley and that an area further from Langley consisting entirely of existing single-family homes was moved instead.  The Great Falls Citizens Association stated publicly that was the best possible outcome for them under the circumstances.

That is how the game has been played in FCPS for well over a decade.  The South Lakes redistricting from 2008, where the School Board deliberately moved higher-income neighborhoods zoned for Westfield, Oakton, and Madison into South Lakes at a time when South Lakes' enrollment had dropped to around 1400 kids, is ancient history.  The School Board members saw the heat that some took for effecting that boundary change and said to themselves "never again."

They hired a boundary policy consultant a few years ago to kick the can down the road, and because some members like to think that a new boundary policy will result in some algorithm for adjusting boundaries that can be applied mechanically and will take the heat off them, but that's a pipe dream.  And any time they so much as hint that they might do a county-wide review of actual boundaries (as opposed to just looking at boundary policy), the groups like "One Great Falls" and "Voices of Fairfax" spring into action to oppose them. [/quote]

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